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Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Vype football predictions

As summer is hopefully winding down and school starting, my thoughts are turning to the upcoming football season.

While making a trip to the store the other day, I noticed the Oklahoma Football Preview magazine (published by VYPE)on the rack and like many others, I coughed up seven bucks and some change to buy it.

The magazine is a nice publication. It has stories on all the state high school football teams, rankings and top players. But I will get to that in a bit.

The first thing that struck me was they had six of the top quarterbacks in the state on the cover along with former OU great Jason White, who was holding his Heisman Trophy.

Three thoughts hit me rather quickly: 1. Almost eight bucks! Geez; 2. Where was Sam Bradford? It would have been rather cool to have him along with White on the cover; 3. Why wasn’t Talihina’s Jordan Eagleroad on the cover?

Now I have not seen these other guys play. I am sure they are good. But I also doubt a couple of them could carry Eagleroad’s athletic supporter (not that they would probably want to).

No, Eagleroad does not have all the passing yards they do. He plays on a team that is old-fashioned run first, but he is probably one of the most dangerous running quarterbacks in the state and Eagleroad has led his team to back-to-back undefeated seasons during the regular season.

And as an athlete, I really doubt any of the quarterbacks could match up with him. I could be wrong, but…

Anyway, according to Vype, Poteau and Talihina are expected to have good seasons. Some of the information is a little stale, of course. But if I wrote articles on every team in the state, I would want an early start also.

Poteau is ranked 12th in Class 4A and expected to finish third in the district behind No. 4 Broken Bow and seventh-ranked Sallisaw. In 4A-4, the Pirates are picked third. It also lists Nick Donathan as starting at receiver. Huh?

In 3A, Spiro is ranked 26th and fourth in its district behind Seminole, Stigler and Atoka. It shows Clayton Mitchem as the returning starter at quarterback but I have not heard if he will be playing at Spiro this year after having eligibility problems last year.

Among county schools in Class 2A, Talihina is picked third despite moving up a class. The Tigers are predicted to win District 2A-6 over Vian. Panama is fourth, Pocola fifth and Heavener sixth. Panama is 32nd, Pocola 45th and Heavener 52nd out of 58 teams.

Arkoma and Bokoshe are playing in District C-4 this season. The Mustangs are picked fifth in the district while Bokoshe is eighth.

The magazine is first class...sure I've found some errors but then its my guess any publication, monthly-weekly or otherwise as well as live electronic broadcast medias have their mistakes. The Golden Tigers move to Class 2A gave the teams in Class A a sigh of relief. The Talihina-Vian matchup week ten is huge. Spiro's ranking seems about right to me given the success of the other teams ranked in front of the Bulldogs. Also note that Stigler jumped from Class 2A to 3A this year. Here's an idea--why not offer a LeFlore Co. column monthly to VYPE...call it C-L Craig's List Leflore style.